Sunday, 6 November 2016

James Graydon: Harmonic Soloing Masterclass

James Graydon returns to give you a new perspective on soloing! He will teach you how to empower your lead work by harmonising your melodic lines and imply all manner of harmonic elements in your own guitar solos!

James says 'We're going to be exploring the concepts behind harmonic soloing. Firstly, using intervals such as 3rds, 6ths and 10ths to harmonise your melodic lines, as well as using pedal tones. Next, we get under the hood a little bit and look at shell voicings; two and three note voicings that perfectly encapsulate what the chord is trying to say in as economical a way as possible. It opens up a completely new world of possibilities in solo playing, whether you're doing Jazz, Blues, Rock or even Folk and Country.

Also, if you're playing in a band setting it's particularly useful to learn how to interact properly with bass players and keyboard players, knowing which notes to leave out, and leave some of that space in the lower mid range of the music.

After that, we'll be looking at inner lines. These are fragments that run in the chord giving an extra sense of depth and maturity to the playing. Also, using dissonance or close voicings that keyboard players often play, we can use them to great effect in the middle of the chord or in the outer reaches of the chord to add some tension and resolution to the playing.

A lot of the time music is about what you leave out, not just what you put in. In the PDF we'll be looking at some of the theory behind chord structures and you'll learn that not all notes are equal when it comes to chords sometimes. You can leave certain things out to create a sense of clarity in your playing. When we hear players like John Scofield, or Pat Metheny in a trio setting or even the Police and The Red Hot Chilli Peppers, they've all mastered this art of economy.

Finally, in part three I'll be taking you step by step through a solo I've constructed for a new track written especially for this pack it's called 'Between The Lines' which encompasses all of the theory and all of the techniques.

Even if you take a little bit of this knowledge and slowly incorporate it into your own playing, I can assure you that you will start thinking about lead lines in a different way with the implied harmony underneath. It's going to give you a completely different perspective on your soloing. Enjoy!'

As ever, we have included everything you need to practise and perfect the material in this package. Starting with the main masterclass PDF lesson teaching you all the concepts, you'll also find 38 exercises, 10 main melody videos, 23 solo line videos, a full 5 minute solo performance, full length backing track and complete TAB/Notation for everything!